Questions for the Devs

Sharajat

1)  What is your plan for making the repetitive bits feel less repetitive?  Every game has repetitive aspects.  The difference between good games and bad games is even the bits that are almost identical to other bits have enough strategy/interaction/hooks to keep things interesting.  With that in mind, what aspect of gameplay will keep the player involved and interested during repetitive bits (i.e. bits that contain no new content, or almost no new content)? 

 

2)  Since you have chosen a class based system, how will you offer enough depth in each class without making the class seem unfocused?  If you have certain non-combat focused classes that will be necessary for missions and gameplay (which you've stated you have) what is your strategy to avoid the "Cleric bullet" or "Healer burnout" effect? 

3)  Eventually, if people invest enough time and effort into their characters, they reach a plateau where their power is more or less equal (max level, endgame in EVE, etc.).  What is your strategy for such an endgame?  Where do you envision the players traveling in that endgame? 

 

4)  A big concept in Stargate is exploring new worlds.  How do you intend to balance the desire to see many new worlds with the necessity of each world being in depth enough to be considered its own planet?  Potentially you have an area several THOUSAND times larger than that of the largest MMOs ever created.  How do you intend to let the player interact with these worlds without a feeling of 'artificiality' - the feeling that each world is just a nifty new instance?

 

5) The creators of the show were often limited by budget, time constraints, and the limits of only having 40 minutes of screen time to convey a story.  Thus it often felt like the team hopped through the stargate and was immediately dragged into some plot.  Do you intend to replicate this feeling, i.e. have people hop through and be dragged into the plot immediately, or will the player be allowed to interact with worlds on his own terms?  If you envision a mixture of the two, have you thought of any way to create a middle ground between fully explorable world and 'world-as-a-linear-instance?'